


The Small Matter of Pause

by westwoodandridingcrops



Series: 2nd Sheriarty 30 Day Challenge [4]
Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-30
Updated: 2017-07-30
Packaged: 2018-12-09 01:26:47
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,171
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11658735
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/westwoodandridingcrops/pseuds/westwoodandridingcrops
Summary: At first, I thought it was just him fucking off and toying with me. That I could have understood. I’m a reasonable guy, after all. But, it isn’t that. What it is is Sherlock Holmes suffering from the one thing I can’t cure him from.





	The Small Matter of Pause

**Author's Note:**

> "We have an aristocracy of personality. There is a kind of classlessness in Irish society because we are more interested in a man's mind or personality than his title or income." - Ulick O'Connor

I hate waiting. When I snap my fingers, a car appears, a deal finishes, a bullet fires. Sometimes all three at once. In the blink of an eye, I have whatever it is I’ve wanted almost before I’ve started to want it.  
  


Adler says it’s because I was deprived as a child. I never got anything I wanted, so now, I must have all the things I want all at once. Nonsense. The streets made me this way because that’s the way they operate. You want money? Steal for it, beg for it, lie for it. If you want to fight or feast or fuck, just do it. Do it. Right now. Why wait? There’s nothing stopping you. Only the very, very rich and the very, very poor know perfect freedom. Being one only led to me feeling utterly comfortable as the other. The digs are certainly nicer. The food is certainly more palatable. But, the company is often just as miserable as it ever was.  
  


So, I became Jim Moriarty because I was already Jim Moriarty, and the moral of the story, dear children, is that waiting features not at all in any of it.  
  


Until now.  
  


At first, I thought it was just him fucking off and toying with me. That I could have understood. I’m a reasonable guy, after all. But, it isn’t that. What it  _is_  is Sherlock Holmes suffering from the one thing I can’t cure him from.  
  


He’s middle class. And, it huuuuuuurts me.  
  


See, the middle class is made to wait. All those desk jobs, all those simpering, ridiculous manners. As if any of it matters a whit. All that idle time never used for anything other than ‘status maintenance.’ It’s so stodgy and heavy and tiresome. Sherlock pretends he’s different. That he is as silken as the shirts he wears. Please. Perhaps the pattern is different, but I can assure you it is twill and tweed and wool all the way down to his sensible and, Christ,  _indexed_  socks.  
  


Sherlock Holmes is not good at letting himself have what he wants. Perhaps, for an instant, he thought otherwise when he was younger and more reckless. The coke was an aberration, I’ve learned, not an indication of character. There is nothing the middle class is better at than bloody restraint, and he is their rather unexpected king.  
  


Example 1: Sherlock Holmes loves dogs. All that loyalty and eagerness. One could make unflattering parallels to Dr. Watson, if in fact, one was in the mood to be unflattering. Too much work for too little payoff, personally. But, make no mistake, Sherlock loves them. Yet, he won’t allow himself one. “John’s allergic,” used to be the excuse. But, John’s been gone for months now and still no dog.  
  


Example 2: Sherlock Holmes loves food. More than once I’ve bit through my lip watching him eat. He eats like most people fuck. It nearly drives me spare. He moans like a pornstar when anything chocolate finds its way into his mouth. His eyes go glassy with the promise of pancakes and that bubble gum tongue laps satin lips anytime anyone mentions tikka masala. Still, he goes days without eating. He swears it’s because he can’t remember, can’t be bothered, can’t be slowed down. He’s voracious, and still, nothing can convince him to taste a morsel when he doesn’t want to.  
  


Example 3: Sherlock Holmes loves sex. Loves it. Is addicted to it like nothing else (experiments with blow, notwithstanding). It starts with a phone call. It always does. When he allows, he will drag me to bed for hours. Sometimes, entire weekends are lost between his thighs. I turn his back to ribbons. He responds by rimming me until I can’t remember ever being anywhere but spread before him. He gives and he takes and he demands and just fucking  _melts_  and every new height is just a dare for the next. And, still, weeks and months may go by before he asks for me again.      
  


And that is where we are now, smack in the middle of Example 3. I am waiting for his next call as I have been waiting for the last two weeks. It does no good to call him first. It also does no good to show up at Baker Street. Shockingly, even being particularly clever isn’t enough to allow me to slither into his trousers. In this, he is absolutely monkish and awful in his constancy. It must only be done at his insistence precisely as he would have it done. Drama queen.  
  


Sherlock has made it clear the only way I am to have him is when he breaks, when his mind is tearing itself to pieces with boredom. Only then will he submit to his own hedonism, and I’m there each and every time to press him.  
  


Each time it ends, and I’m left again peeking at my iPhone and willing it to ring. Each time, I hate him a little more because the itch under my skin gets worse. Every minute after feels like two minutes before. It's the worst type of mathematics I've ever encountered, this exponential torture.  
  


I fantasize about not answering, about what it would feel like to leave him hanging instead. I'm vindictive enough to want it. Honestly, it's my nature to be just that sort of cruel, but it would do no good. How do you torture the self-flagellator? How do you burn the heart out of someone whose whole life has been dedicated to the self-immolation of the same? A death by a thousand cigarette burns. What's one more?  
  


I hate him. I love him. I’ve never seen anything like him. I am him.     
  


He knows it, and he uses it. Worse,  _I_  know it and let him use it. It's that good. He’s gone and made himself necessary, and I’m not sure if I want to rip his skin off strip by strip or fucking grovel on my knees. I’ve seen men do the second at the threat of the first, and if my own experience runs the risk of looking anything like it, it’s best he never sees. I suspect he knows so anyway.  
  


The irony of my position doesn’t escape me. It itches and irritates my skin. It prickles my neck like sour, dried sweat. My scalp crawls, and my hands clench. I am a beast of burden at the sight of his indifference.  
  


Look at me. He’s reduced me to clichés. He reduces me to lots of things I'm not proud of.  
  


My phone is ringing now. I stare at it and contemplate my plan for the upper-hand.  
  


_Once._   
  


I am a weaker man now.   
  


_Twice._   
  


I should kill him for it. I've killed a whole lot for a lot less.   
  


“Yes?”  
  


“Aren’t you coming? Don’t keep me waiting.”  
  


And, God’s bleeding fucking cunt, he knows I can't, won't. Becuase, I can't wait for anything I want, and there's never been anything I've ever wanted more than him. 

 


End file.
